Exclusive first look at N.O.V.A. 3 for Xbox Windows Phone 8

Yesterday’s E3 2013 press conferences gave us lots of juicy console news and game announcements, but our gaming readers who don’t play consoles didn’t get much to chew on from the conferences. Hey, we haven’t forgotten you guys (or me since I love gaming on my phone). We squeezed in a few meetings yesterday and came away with…

Exclusive first footage of N.O.V.A. 3 in action! That’s right, we played Gameloft’s sci-fi First-Person Shooter for Windows Phone 8 and lived to tell the tale. I actually had a little more time to play than usual, and so we can show you lots of highlights of the first level. Head past the break for the video and more details!

Mobile combat evolved

N.O.V.A. 3 stars an officer in the Near Orbit Vanguard Alliance (not the most meaningful acronym) named Kal Warden. Kal is the hero of previous games in the series and therefor many of the soldiers he meets will be impressed by his exploits. Kal’s mission in the new game is to recover an alien artifact that could make the earth livable once more while also battling the equally alien but evil Volterite army.

The game starts with our hero’s arrival in the ruins of San Francisco. After learning the ropes of shooting and using his Force-like powers, Val quickly joins a squad of soldiers already battling the Volterite forces. You’ll experience fully voiced cut-scenes throughout each level, giving the game a very cinematic feel.

Since this title has less of a real world focus than Modern Combat 4, it allows the player to jump about like a rabbit. Buttons for jumping, zooming, sprinting, and using Kal’s powers can be found near the virtual stick and primary fire buttons at the bottom of the screen. I really like the virtual stick; it shows up wherever you place your left thumb and relocates when you put your thumb in a different position.

N.O.V.A. 3 generally controls just like Modern Combat 4, so if you can handle those controls, you’ll do fine with this game. I found them easy to jump right into, but some players will require more of an adjustment period. With a game this beautiful and fully featured, the learning curve is worth braving.

Achievements

Want to know N.O.V.A. 3’s Achievements early? Well, here you go.

Lightning Fast: Complete Level 2 in under 20 minutes

Flawless: Complete a campaign level without ever retrying

Close Call: Have your hP reduced to less than 10%, avoid dying and recover to full HP

Lone Ranger: Complete a level using only the pistol

Versatile Warrior: Kill at least one enemy with each weapon in the game in the same level

Headhunter: Get 10 headshots with the sniper rifle in a Campaign level

Blind Shot: Kill one enemy with the sniper rifle without using the aim

Bullseye: Finish a level with accuracy higher than 60%

Collector: Buy all the upgrades available in the Campaign mode

Humanity Saved: Complete the Campaign mode

Multiplayer

Full Armory: Wield 7 weapons in a match

Stress Relief: Kill a sniper with a melee weapon

Against All Odds: Kill 5 enemies in a match while under 25% energy

Fly Swatter: Kill a flying enemy

Star Player: Be the best player during a match

Slick: Capture 3 flags without dying during a match

Make it count: Kill an enemy with your last bullet

Five in a row: Win 5 consecutive matches

Hijacked: Hijack a vehicle after killing its driver

Ghost in the Machine: Kill 10 enemies with the Mech

The fight starts soon

We can’t say when N.O.V.A. 3 will launch, but it will have been worth the wait. It features one of the most robust single-player campaigns around AND local Wi-Fi and online multiplayer, so FPS fans won’t want to miss it.

N.O.V.A. 3 requires a Windows Phone 8 handset with 1 GB of RAM and plenty of storage space. It will cost $6.99.

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD AND ALL THAT IS HOLY.........WHY THE HELL CAN WE NOT GET PORTS OF GAMELOFT GAMES TO WINDOWS RT...........I NEED A REAL GOLF GAME, A REAL SOCCER GAME, A REAL FPS, ETC. AND I AM SURE THAT THERE ARE MANY LIKE ME ON WINDOWS 8 TABS THAT FEEL THE SAME WAY.

Getting sick of my 8X being treated as a second-class citizen - the game is out and it's yet another Lumia exclusive. Very disheartening. If Nokia plan to force every other manufacturer out of the WP hardware race, they will most likely find their struggle to gain traction will be [i]harder[/i] if no other OEMs are trying to push it. They need to understand that too many exclusives is a bad thing.
Not to mention there wasn't even the slightest hint that this was going to be a Lumia exclusive.

I do notice that on the Web Store page, the app's capabilities include both WXGA (Lumia 920 resolution) and HD720P (8X resolution). Usually Lumia exclusives only list WXGA capability, so I am vaguely hopeful that this game will come to other non-Lumia devices before the end of time. If we have to wait out the ridiculous exclusitivity period, then 1) the game will be obsolete, or 2) WP8.x will be obsolete and the game may not even run on newer versions...

Would it be impossible for a FPS to reconfigure the "top" buttons (i.e. Volume and Camera on my Lumia) to serve as triggers, so that we could use our thumbs for only for the "move" and "look" virtual sticks? You'd have to set audio level via a menu screen instead of course, but wouldn't this be so much better?
The gameplay here looks very clunky when the player has to relinquish aim in order to fire a shot.

I'd like some mod/admin/writer to shine some light on this fact because Devs are copping a lot of flak for releasing unoptimised games for WP8. I'd like to lay the blame squarely on Microsoft's shoulders.

The current Xbox has 512 MB of RAM and runs the latest releases whereas WP8 devices with anything less than 1 GB of RAM cannot run any of the top of the line games because MS has this restriction where even on 1 GB RAM devices, no single app (game) can actually utilise more than 380 MB of RAM. THAT, there is the problem. So when a Dev says 1 GB needed, he/she actually has only 380 MB of RAM to work with. This applies only to 1 GB devices and is lesser for 512 MB devices and so now you can see why it takes so long to "optimise" or port to the bulk of the WP userbase.

You don't have to take my word for it, check out the developers documentation or Google it.

In WP 7.x we had the problem of porting apps/games.Now on WP8.x we have enormous problems of optimizing the apps/games.MS should push devs to optimize the apps.It's ridiculous seeing games to run @ 256mb ram on other OS and on WP demand a minimum of 1GB.

It's pushing over 2 million pixels and still has iPad 2 quality graphics. The GPUs share architecture, but the Vits is slated to play console quality games. I'd like to see the iPad 4 play a console game a full resolution with no screen tearing and AA.

Glad to see good games coming to Windows Phone 8 but I already beat it. I have no desire to play it again, if I did I already have it on my tablet. So sorry to say I will not be purchasing. We need to get new and fresh games as well.

This. do you buy a cheap, low-end Computer with 2GB of ram and expect it to run Crysis 3 on very high? NO! so you can't buy a cheap, low-end Phone with 0.5 GB of ram and expect it to run NOVA 3.
it's that simple. upgrade your devices losers

I have a "high end" lumia 820 and can't install any of the new games because i have "other storage" issues.
Unless Microsoft fix this in the next update or give us the possibility to install things in the microSD i'm sooo jumping ships.
It's simple, devs and microsoft need to get their sh## together

I own a L620, i cant play this, BUT THIS IS PERFECTLY FINE!! complaining about temple run is OK but this freaking awesome game on a 512mb device? go check your android friends before you complain about this !!